


Fate Chances Moonlight

by simmerup



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Brief Smut, Happy Ending, M/M, Mostly Fluff, also a little bit of jealous!louis, and hotel owner!Louis, dad!louis, daycare!Harry, harry and zayn are roommates, i use the word 'smile' a million times i'm sorry, it's not much but i tried, jay is mentioned a few times, kiwi mv antics, lots of smiling in this fic, nanny!Niall lol, oblivious louis because that's fun, oh also bartender!Louis, okay here we go, she has already passed in this story but nothing else is canonical really, ziam is side
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-14
Updated: 2018-02-14
Packaged: 2019-03-16 15:44:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 16,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13639302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/simmerup/pseuds/simmerup
Summary: Single dad Louis is this close to giving up on daycares altogether and just hiring Niall as his full-time nanny when Liam convinces him to give it one more go. It was the first in a long line of daycares that has driven Louis to the edge, but it's under new ownership, and this guy is not at all what Louis was expecting.





	1. I

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Jenni (1DforOlds)](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Jenni+%281DforOlds%29).



“Miss Applebaum said what, now?” he asks again, because…well, he had to have heard her wrong the first time.

“She said someday I’ll start bleeding and never stop and then I’ll know what a real owie is and that _my_ owie isn’t a real one,” Jo cries, wet streaks down her cheeks still dripping from her chin. At least the snot leaking from her nose is beginning to dry.

“And which owie is that?” Louis asks, tucking his thumbs into his sweater sleeves and wiping along her cheekbones.

She lifts an arm into the air to show him her elbow, which sports a cut that probably should have been bandaged but is otherwise not really too worrisome. Still, he’s sure it hurt when it happened, however it happened. Even if it doesn’t hurt as much as menstrual cramps will, which. Turns out he really _had_ heard it right the first time.

Louis keeps his brow furrowed, an air of concern perfectly etched into all his features for her benefit. He takes her by the wrist gently, leans closer to examine the cut. Jo sniffles.

“You know, isn’t Miss Applebaum _really_ old? Gray hair, wrinkles…does she have glasses? I can’t seem to remember,” he begins.

“Yeah,” Jo whimpers, looking as though she was finally being included in an adult conversation in that way children do when you confide in them something that makes them feel important.

“Yeah, glasses?”

She nods. More snot begins to drip. Louis digs a tissue out of his back pocket, because he keeps those there these days, and hands it to her. She just takes it into her damp palms and balls it up, never breaking eye contact.

“See, I think her vision is starting to go. Know what that means?” he asks. He spares his knees from the actual agony of crouching any longer and stands, offering his hands down toward her at the same time she reaches for him and shakes her head. “It means she can’t see as well as she used to.” He hoists her into his arms. “Because that’s _clearly_ a real owie if I ever saw one. Right?”

And there’s the smile he’s been waiting for. The one that looks just like his, albeit a little more watery. “Right.”

“And it bloody hurts, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah!”

“I say we get it cleaned up, put a nice bandaid on it, have a warm cuppa, and have a sleepover in the living room. What do you say?”

Her wounded arm juts into the air again, fist pointed toward the ceiling. “Yeah!” Her tears are finally forgotten.

“Yeah!” he shouts with her. He carries her into the bathroom, lifting her higher yet so that she sits on his shoulder. Like a little champion.

Three months later, Louis calls the fourth daycare he’s attempted to trust with his daughter’s care to inform them he’ll no longer be needing their services. He’s at his wits’ end, and Niall knows it.

“Look, mate, I’ll just watch her for a while and eventually something better will come up. It’s no big deal.”

“Isn’t it?” Louis asks, sounding only a little crazy. He throws back what’s left of his beer. “Shouldn’t this be part of the whole thing that’s easy? Y’know, like…am I daft? Tell me, Niall, honestly, am I going about this wrong? I just…”

“Okay, give me that - “

“I’m daft.”

“Right now? Yeah, yer daft.” Niall successfully snatches Louis’ empty bottle from him before he cracks it open to lick the insides. Not that he’s done that before, but stranger things have happened. A mischievous giggle echoes from the kitchen. “Jo?” Niall calls before Louis thinks to.

The giggle pauses and starts up again, and then a head of sloppy brown curls bobs around the side of the sofa. When she appears, she climbs onto it, onto Louis’ lap and wraps her arms around his neck and pretends to fall asleep instantly on his shoulder.

“How can I be so bad at something I’ve been doing for three years?” Louis asks, aware of his daughter but hardly alert. He puts an absentminded hand on her back to keep her there.

Niall sighs. “You’re not bad at it. What’s the whole thing you were on about a minute ago?”

“Hm?”

“You said this is part of the whole thing that should be easy.”

“Oh, like. Being a single dad and that.”

“Dad!” Jo cheers like she’s correctly answered a test question.

Louis gasps, puts a hand to his chest. “That’s me!”

With another giggle, Jo slides ungracefully off Louis’ lap and pokes both of Niall’s knees as she passes them on her way out of the room. Niall watches her go, and Louis watches Niall. He knows he’s had too much, always does when Niall comes around because he knows Niall will keep an eye on her. Jo. Niall always keeps an eye on her for him. He shouldn’t drink, shouldn’t have had even one.

“Don’t let me ‘ave anymore,” Louis says quietly to break the silence that followed Jo’s departure.

Niall clicks the telly on and sits back in the recliner with the paper cup of gas station coffee he’s been nursing for at least three hours. “Wasn’t planning on it.”

Louis wakes the next morning on the same sofa. He isn’t hungover, was only a little gone last night, but he is glad Niall stayed anyway. Not on the recliner, of course. His shoes are still kicked off by the front door, though, so he’s in Louis’ bed. Hopefully he didn’t let Jo stay up too late.

He knows Niall likes pancakes, but he burnt them last time and doesn’t feel like attempting it again. He pulls out three bowls, milk, and two boxes of cereal instead.

Jo is already awake when he goes to retrieve her. With a delicate touch and something of an elegant grip for a three-year-old, she’s pressing her clean paintbrush to the window above her bed. Louis watches her paint an invisible picture onto the panes of glass for a moment; she drags the brush over top some other paintings she’s already done. Real ones with real paint. He had only been angry about it for a second when it happened, but he couldn’t have her thinking she can paint on things like windows and walls. She promised to only pretend from now on unless actual paper is available and has kept the promise. He still likes to watch her pretend.

“What’s that one?” he asks, remaining in the doorway of her bedroom. The chipped white paint on her doorframe flakes a little when he does push off of it; he promises himself he’ll sweep it up later.

She doesn’t turn, probably already knew he was there. With her free hand, she points to the picture frame on the nightstand by her bed. Louis doesn’t have to look to know whose face she means.

“Oh, yeah? Make sure you get the hair right. Nan loved her hair to look pretty.”

“I _did_.”

“You did? You sure? I think you’ve messed up a little right there,” he says, approaching her and touching his finger to a spot on the glass.

“Don’t touch!” she gasps, swatting his hand away.

“And right there.” Another touch.

“Dad!”

“And right _there_.” This time he pokes her nightgown-clad belly. “And _here_.” A poke on the shoulder.

She tries to fight him off in earnest, but her oppositions give way to giggles as they usually do, and Louis tickles her until they both forget about her painting and his mum. When he’s finished, he holds a hand out to her and says, “Let’s go get Uncle Niall.”

And while they run through their little home, he thinks he _is_ a good dad. At least good enough. He’ll find a daycare soon, and until he does, he has Niall (who does not respond well to being woken by tiny hands tickling the soft parts of his feet, Louis standing by in case he kicks like a cow). He won’t have to sell the hotel, and he won’t have to move closer to his sisters. Everything will be alright. It always is.

 

***

 

“Liam, you’re looking dashing today. Hot date?” Louis asks, falling into his desk chair he’d just kicked his friend out of.

“Actually, yes.”

Liam is the relatively new second shift. Louis still considers him relatively new even though he’s now been there over a year because he’s the only one who’s newer than Louis, who was the new guy _two_ years ago (technically). They didn’t get along at first - Louis is too abrasive sometimes and doesn’t know when to bite his tongue, especially concerning this hotel, and Liam was far too uptight until Louis straightened him out. Now, apart from Niall, it sometimes feels like he’s Louis’ only friend.

With that thought, Louis pulls out his phone and checks to see if Niall’s had any pressing issues with his kid in the forty-five minutes since he’s left them alone. So far so good.

“Really,” he responds, not actually surprised. Liam dates a lot, and nothing ever comes of them. He wonders if that’s the point, if Liam just has really bad luck, or if he likes going on a lot of first dates with a lot of different people. Louis can’t judge either way, hasn’t dated much (at all) in over four years. “Anyone I know?”

“Don’t think so. Just this guy from the bookstore I met the other day.”

“He works at the bookstore?”

“No, he was shopping.”

“This is important. What did he buy?”

“Louis, I don’t know, I wasn’t paying that close of attention.”

“You totally were, now what did he buy?”

Liam rolls his eyes and pops a powdered donut hole into his mouth to avoid answering. But Louis refuses to look away until he does, so once the donut hole is down, Liam rolls his eyes again and sighs. “I don’t know, something by Andrew Smith.”

“Was it _Grasshopper Jungle_? It was _Grasshopper Jungle_ , had to be.”

“Probably. Verdict?”

“Fantastic book. This could be a good one,” Louis tells him, snatching a donut hole from the plastic container in Liam’s lap. “I’ve got a good feeling. Let me know how it goes.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

In the silence that follows, they both find themselves staring at the security camera feed on Louis’ desk. There isn’t much there - three frames show different parts of their half-full parking lots. Nobody is coming or going; every check-in is already here, and it seems they intend to remain for now. Another frame is dark - the empty bar. It doesn’t open for another two hours. The frame that’s supposed to show the back door shows only static; the garbage trucks that empty their dumpsters flung a rock into it and Louis hasn’t gotten around to replacing it yet. Two frames show the upstairs and downstairs hallways, one empty, one with a young girl crossing the hall to a different room. The last two frames show the lobby and laundry room.

Liam eventually leaves, his donut holes forgotten on Louis’ desk, and in a moment he’s in the laundry room. Louis watches the dark room light up, watches his friend sort the laundry the housekeepers left behind this morning and start a load. He empties the drier, full of clean sand-colored towels, and begins folding one. And as if the thought just now occurs to him, he glances up to where the camera is stuck in the corner of the laundry room and holds up his middle finger in its direction. Louis snorts.

It’s a weird sense of deja vu, watching Liam on the same screen he used to watch his mother, sometimes for hours on end. They’d struck up that deal, that he’d watch the cameras for suspicious activity to keep him occupied and not bored out of his mind while she did laundry. Sometimes he’d have to do it while also watching his sisters, at least until whatever babysitter his mum had hired that week came to pick them up. When he watched her, she never flipped him off. Maybe made a few faces at him, and he’d make them back because he knew she couldn’t see them.

“Right.”

He checks his phone again to find that Niall still hasn’t had any problems, and then he pulls the bar room keys out of his desk drawer. It’s earlier than he usually opens, but he has nothing better to do here today, and half the guests are the same construction crew from last month who spent as much time and money sat on his bar stools as Louis would let them. He figures if he’s making money, opening early can’t hurt.

While he’s stocking and washing the few dishes he didn’t feel like doing the previous night, he let his thoughts return to that little predicament he’s been keen to ignore a majority of the time. But he’s a good person, likes to think he’s a good friend, and he doesn’t want to take advantage of Niall’s generosity even though he also knows the boy doesn’t mind whatsoever and probably wouldn’t mind if Louis dragged this out for more months than he already has. And Jo adores Niall anyway.

Still, he’s got to find _someone_. There has to be someone in the area he hasn’t tried. Maybe he should be looking for a nanny rather than a daycare. Maybe he’s just going about this all wrong.

The night comes and goes as it typically does. Liam left halfway through his shift as agreed upon, and his replacement only needed Louis to abandon his post once to deal with a problem concerning one of the room’s showers. Other than that, Louis mans his bar until midnight. It’s then that, as agreed upon, Liam returns to bartend the last two hours he promised the construction crew (normally the bar closes at midnight) and close so that Louis can go home and relieve Niall of his nanny duties.

“Thanks, mate,” Louis tells his friend, pocketing his tips and unrolling his sleeves as he steps out from behind the bar.

Liam slides in behind him and drums the pads of his fingers against the counter. “Sure thing.”

“I swear, if Jo is still awake I’ll kill that Irish guy.” He’s mostly just trying to make small talk, though he doesn’t know why. It’s the end of the night and he’s tired and he wants to go home, but if he leaves without fucking around then are he and Liam really friends or are they coworkers? Louis doesn’t know, but he’s self-conscious about it, so even though he has nothing to say he says something anyway, every time.

“Niall?”

Louis slides into one of the stools. He isn’t the only one out here; a trio of burly older men from the construction crew who look like they’ve forgotten what personal hygiene is are still sitting on the opposite corner of the bar where they’ve been since Louis opened.

Liam sets a beer in front of him, startling him less than it should have. Louis blinks at it. “Probably shouldn’t.”

“It’s already opened. Might as well.”

Louis sighs. “Don’t let me have another one. I mean it, or you’re fired.”

“So Niall’s your stay-at-home nanny now?”

“Pretty much. ‘M grateful for him, really, but I feel bad. He’s a young lad, you know? Sacrificing too much of his time on me. I should be a better friend, get my shit together and all that so he can go back to living his life.”

Liam is leaning against the back counter, arms folded across his chest. He says, “I’m sure he wouldn’t do it if he really minded. I don’t know him as well as you do, but he just seems the type. Also, speaking of your whole ordeal, I meant to tell you. Zayn’s got this friend - “

“Shit, Liam,” Louis blurts, letting a light fist fall onto the bartop. “Forgot to ask. How was your date?”

“I’ll tell you in a second. So listen, he’s got this friend - “

“Zayn’s his name?”

“Yeah, Zayn.”

“All right.”

“So he has this friend who just started working at the daycare on Sunset. The one with the coral shutters and cute garden out front?”

Louis nods. “I know the one. It was the first.”

Liam pauses. “The first?”

“The first daycare I ever tried with Jo. Can’t remember the lady’s name anymore, but this fucking woman I swear to god - “

“Was she old? Like not too old, but, you know…older?”

“Yeah. With like, really long hair?”

“That’s the one. Well, she died.” Oh. Louis isn’t sure how to respond anymore, so he doesn’t. “And Zayn’s friend - shit, I’ve forgotten his name now - but he’s going to be taking the place over. Just moved here. I figured I’d let you know that if you haven’t tried there yet - or, I suppose, if you want to try them again - you’ll be dealing with someone new. He’s young, loves kids, is apparently just this great guy. Zayn did nothing but sing his praises.”

Only halfway through his bottle, Louis knows it’s time to go. It just feels like that point in the conversation where he’ll be able to wrap things up quickly. He begins to slide off his stool, situates himself. “You sure he’s not pulling a fast one on you?”

“What?”

“Sounds like this Zayn character might be a little too invested in his friend.”

Liam rolls his eyes, recognizes Louis’ signs and takes the bottle away. “Don’t be a twat, Lou. I’m just saying. If you want to give Niall a break, go try the place out, or he’ll be adding nanny to his resume next.”

“Niall the Nanny has a nice ring to it, really.”

“Go home, Louis.”

 

***

 

Marigold’s Play Place looks almost identical to how it was the last time Louis and Jo walked hand and hand up its small wooden porch stairs. The screen door is still obnoxiously outdated, added to the small house a few years back (as Louis’s been told) as an extra preventative layer between a small child and the unprotected front yard. Their small fingers have learned how to unlock deadbolts, but the weird little notch under the screen door handle is a different beast. The shutters are still a striking coral, the garden still in impeccable condition, and the personally painted mailbox they’d passed still makes Louis cringe, all the wrong colors in all the wrong places. All that’s different about it is the bright yellow and blue “Marigold’s Play Place” emblem that had been plastered onto the front of the house, right there on the white siding - large enough to see clearly from the street. It’s painted over now, replaced by an unfinished, barely-visible outline that simply read, “Styles’ Smiles.”

Louis hates daycares, he really does.

A young woman answers the chime of the doorbell, and Louis doesn’t remember her from the last time. He only remembers the old woman who’s died - Marigold Morberry, as he now recalls - and her less old but certainly not young assistant whose face sort of resembled Allison Janney’s. _This_ woman is far younger, perhaps right around Louis’ age even. Freckled and a little gangly, but pretty all the same.

He’s suddenly glad Niall will be the one picking Jo up most days.

“Hi there,” Louis smiles. “We spoke on the phone earlier?”

“Mr. Tomlinson, yeah. Hi. Come in. Sorry about the mess, we’re still settling in here,” she says, stepping aside.

Jo runs inside ahead of him, already spying something of interest. A small chalkboard, tucked away in the far corner of the room surrounded by a few boxes of unpacked toys. Louis follows, intending to make himself at home on the ugly, bright yellow sofa near that chalkboard, but the freckled woman continues walking into the kitchen, so Louis follows her instead.

“Can I get you anything to drink? I’ve just made some coffee, like, ten minutes ago.”

The kitchen is less colorful than that first room, thank god. Surrounded by a more neutral palette, Louis is less on edge. He leans against a counter and shakes his head, picking at the webbed skin between his thumb and index finger. “No, thanks though.”

It’s awkward small talk, and he’s not sure why they’re having it. She hasn’t introduced herself yet either, which is also awkward.

“Okay, well. You said you used to bring your daughter here when Marigold still owned it?” she asks, leaning against the counter opposite him. Her shoulders are hunched a little, almost like she’s nervous. Would she be nervous?

“Yes. Not the greatest experience of our lives, if I’m honest. Probably wouldn’t have come back, but I’m running out of options. Haven’t had great experiences at _any_ daycare around here, truthfully.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” she says. Her winced face looks like she means it. “But I’m glad you’re back. Although, can I ask what made you return?”

“Oh, I was referred. My friend knows a guy who apparently knows…uh, you? I think?” Was it a girl Liam had mentioned the other night? Louis could have sworn the friend of his date’s was a guy, could have sworn Liam used male pronouns. But that can’t be right, can it.

“Hm. Probably not me. I’m only here for a few days, helping my brother out. I don’t know many people here.”

“Your brother?”

“Yeah, Harry. He’s taking over here. Marigold left the house and the business to him.”

Well, at least Louis’ memory isn’t failing him yet. “Harry. All right. And your name is?”

The girl’s eyes widen. “Oh! Wow, I’m so sorry. I’m Gemma.”

She pushes away from the counter to shake his hand, and Louis thinks that up close she really is very pretty. Niall will like her, he knows it. He almost wants to be present the first time they meet.

“Hi,” he tells her again, offering a reassuring adult smile. Louis’ been told he has many smiles, and they aren’t all appropriate for normal conversations with normal people he’s just met. It helps to mentally categorize them, so he splits them into ‘adult smiles’ and ‘other smiles.’ The adult smiles are the boring ones, but they’re most approachable and probably most professional. “You know my name already, but I’m Louis, and that’s Jo in there. She’s three.”

“She looks…so much like you.”

He disagrees, but he doesn’t say so. Instead, he gets their conversation back on track so that he and Jo don’t have to be here long. It’s his day off, and he promised Jo a pottery-painting date followed by a _Land Before Time_ marathon, which he will enjoy as much as she will. It sounds fucking wonderful, and though Gemma is already infinitely better to deal with than Marigold or Allison Janney’s doppleganger were, Louis would still like to exit this ridiculous, colorful, cluttered little house as quickly as possible.

“So your brother is good with kids?” he asks.

“He’s _so_ good with kids. Practically a kid himself. At heart, I mean. I think he does a great job of recognizing how different the world is for children today versus what it was like for kids, say, back when Marigold first started, you know? And he’s a lot more sensitive to their specific needs. Marigold had been doing this for a long time, and while she could keep your kid safe and alive, I think it’s hard to say they really…enjoyed their time with her, you know?”

“Oh, I know it.”

“So Harry, like. He definitely realizes that, and he wants the kids to both be safe and have a good time. I mean, I know I’m related to him, but I hope you believe me when I tell you that he really is great at this kind of thing. He’ll take good care of Jo, I think she’ll love him, and you’ll probably love him too. Everyone always does.”

Louis thinks he spots her roll her eyes a little during that last sentence, but the movement is so fast that he can’t be positive. He almost snorts at it.

“Unfortunately, I don’t think I’ll get the chance to interact with him much. I drop her off in the mornings before work, and my friend Niall will be picking her up whenever you guys close. I’ll usually be in a rush, but I’m sure your brother and Niall will get on very well.”

This time, Louis absolutely sees her roll her eyes. “Just don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

“Well, I appreciate the warning. And then, Jo can start coming when?”

Gemma pulls out her phone, begins to scroll through it. “Umm… Monday? Yes, Monday. And we currently have five other children who’ll be here as well.”

Monday. Half a week away yet. Hopefully Niall isn’t too sick of Jo. “Great.”

 

***

 

The afternoon of Jo’s first day back at Marigold’s - _Styles’ Smiles_ , or whatever it is now - Louis is running late.

The bar is to be opened in an hour, and with travel time, that’s hardly long enough to get everything set up and properly ready. The off shift of the construction crew who somehow manage to take over their half of the bar as quickly as Louis unlocks the main entrance will be pissed.

“Let’s go, let’s go,” he mumbles mostly to himself as he shuffles Jo out of her booster seat.

“Let’s go, let’s go,” she repeats, a perfectly mimicked expression of rushed, thinly veiled panic on her face. Louis feels bad about it, but she’ll forget she’s feeling this way in a moment (though he reminds himself to conceal his negative emotions better in the future).

They walk hand in hand up the porch steps again, and Louis notices that the “Styles’ Smiles" emblem on the siding has been finished. The painted letters begin a soft, spring green and halfway through transition into a gentle teal blue with a soft gradient. It’s all outlined in black.

Well, he thinks as he pulls open the annoying swing door to knock on the other one, at least it looks better than Marigold’s had.

Tiny, high-pitched voices chatter ceaselessly inside the house. Louis worries his knocks aren’t heard and tries again, a little more forceful. Jo drops his hand and pounds her small fist on the door too.

“Come _on_ ,” she calls.

Louis almost chuckles. “Don’t be impatient, bub. Comes off as rude.”

She looks up toward him and says nothing, but Louis is convinced she’s judging him.

“I’m coming, I’m coming!” they hear in a distant part of the house, definitely not a child’s voice.

Louis pulls his phone out of his pocket, checks the time. Shit. He chews on the inside corner of his cheek and tries not to let Jo see through him.

When the door finally opens, a small boy with bright orange hair and freckles nearly dodges between them. Louis is so alarmed that this boy is all he sees, and he’s frozen. There isn’t even a full second to process what’s happening - Louis either stops this boy from leaving the porch or he doesn’t, and though he recognizes this, he still can’t seem to get his body to listen to his brain.

But the boy is caught by his upper arm before he even reaches the first step - before he can pass Louis completely - and is redirected back inside by a man who is undoubtedly Gemma’s brother.

“Sorry about that,” he’s saying as he maneuvers the little escape artist around his own body and back through the cracked door. “Come in,” he tosses over his shoulder at them.

Once the boy is finally inside and away from the front door, Gemma’s brother (whose name completely escapes Louis at the moment) stands straight, pushes the door open wider.

Louis waits for the guy to actually look at them so he can respond, but it doesn’t happen; there’s some commotion in that front room that Louis can’t see and Gemma’s brother is distracted by it, looking like he’s considering whether his authority is needed or not. He’s tall with a build that might be gangly like his sister’s or might not be. It could go either way. Louis can only see half of him clearly, the other half shadowed from still being angled toward that front room rather than toward Louis and Jo, but he thinks he must work out or be an athlete of some sort. At the same time, Louis gets the impression this guy doesn’t have total control over his limbs at all times, which is where the gangly thing might come in. Nice jawline from this angle. He might be hot, might not be. Louis is in too much of a rush to care to know for sure right now.

“Actually,” he mumbles quickly, hoping Gemma’s brother is paying enough attention that he won’t have to repeat himself. “I’m running late. Don’t mean to just dump her on you and leave, but - “

Finally, this guy turns toward them, greeting Louis at eye level with a pair of dimples and his own adult smile. “Oh, no, it’s not a…”

So yeah, Louis’ smile categories apply to other people too; it helps him read expressions and situations. Also, definitely nice jawline, even from the front. Especially from the front.

“…problem,” he finishes. Louis can only question the pause in the middle of that sentence for a second before he continues. What on earth is his name again? “Um. Yeah, no big deal. We’ll be fine.”

After a blink, he squats to Jo’s level, who has been waiting quietly by Louis’ side this entire time, a little closer than she had been moments ago. “Hi there,” he tells her, holding out a hand. “I’m Harry.”

Harry. That’s right.

Jo’s own dimples flash when she smiles at him and takes his hand, which surprises Louis a little because he had been getting the impression that she was sort of nervous. Apparently not.

“What’s your name?” Harry asks her, his adult smile shifting into something a little different. Louis tries to decipher it, to categorize it further, but he’s also trying to pay attention to Jo’s initial reactions. She’s had every bad experience Louis has had with daycares - worse, actually, because she’s the one stuck at them - and he had been beginning to worry she would be resistant to attending another one, especially one she’s already been to.

“Jo,” she tells Harry, and she doesn’t even sound shy. If Louis wasn’t laser-focused on how late he is, he’d probably be more surprised by this. Jo definitely gets her social graces from Louis (and maybe even Niall), but only once she gets to know someone. First meetings? No way. She’s usually so shy it’s hard to believe how much she opens up after that initial conversation. So this is both unprecedented and impossible to buy, and yet. Here she is, defying all Louis’ expectations.

“Hi, Jo,” Harry says. “Come on in.” He stands and steps aside again, and Jo scurries inside - straight to the chalk board.

Harry turns back to Louis, who already has one foot down the porch steps. “You’re Louis?”

Louis flashes a quick smile, suddenly aware of his own complete lack of dimples (or any memorable facial feature for that matter). “Yeah. I’ll have to… We’ll have to redo this when I’m not…you know.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Harry says quickly, all in one breath like he’d been holding it for some reason. The smile he’d been giving Jo before is still on his face, and it doesn’t transform back into an adult smile as he continues to watch Louis back away. “Definitely.”

“My friend Niall will pick her up when you close. He’s blonde, Irish. Can’t miss him.”

“All right. I’ll watch for him. I can - “

Louis pauses, hand on his car door. He checks the time on his phone again, tries not to curse aloud, and looks back to Harry.

Harry must realize Louis doesn’t exactly have time for chit chat. “Uh, I’ll tell you tomorrow. Never mind.”

Good. Louis offers one more smile - tight-lipped, but it’s the best he can do - and hops into his car. He tries not to notice Harry still standing in his doorway while he drives away.


	2. II

As expected, Louis is late. Really late. But because he is blessed beyond his own understanding, Liam has the bar completely stocked and ready to be opened by the time Louis gets there. And Louis doesn’t know whether the lad has done it for a raise or just because he’s a good fucking person, but Louis could kiss his feet. Honestly, he might.

“You’re a lifesaver, Payne,” he says as he hustles behind the bar. He’s rolling his sleeves and tucking the shaggier parts of his hair behind his ears somehow at the same time, and when he reaches his friend who is still busying himself with the till, he gets onto his tiptoes, grabs Liam’s head with both hands, and pulls it toward him until he can peck the side of his forehead.

“Ugh,” Liam grimaces, quickly jerking away.

Seriously, Louis hadn’t even texted him. He just…did it. Just juggled both tasks, the front desk and this. “I’m going to do that more than once tonight.”

“Please don’t.”

“Are we busy? Lay it out for me.”

“Absolutely not. The construction crew checked out early.”

“What?”

Liam steps away from the till and leans against the back counter. The motion jostles a few glasses, but he’s unbothered by it. “Yeah. I’m sure they’ll be back, but they didn’t really explain and I didn’t ask. Makes our lives easier, anyway.”

It’s true that this makes things easier. Actually, Louis will be able to leave early now because he just doesn’t see the three rooms currently here - an elderly couple, a middle-aged man here on business (he even had a real-life brief case), and a new family of three - frequenting hotel bars. And even if they did, they don’t seem the types to complain if the bar happened to not be open tonight.

Louis begins thinking about what he’ll make for dinner for when Niall and Jo get home. It’ll be the last thing either of them expect, but Niall will likely be grateful to not have to stay any longer than dinner requires, and Jo will obviously be happy to see him. Hopefully, if this first day goes well. Harry seemed nice enough. Certainly a smiler. He’s even a little charming. Louis isn’t sure he’ll be in love with the guy the way Gemma expects he will be, but honestly anything is an improvement from Marigold and Miss Applebaum and the others.

Liam returns to his post, and Louis already decides he’ll be there longer than Louis will be. Second shift stays until eleven, and in no way does Louis plan to be here then. In the three hours since Louis opened, the business man came and left; he had one whisky sour and a small bag of plain potato chips. Louis is bored out of his mind, so he brings the laptop from his office into the laundry room so that he can watch the camera feeds to see if anyone goes into the barroom while he folds sheets with Liam.

At seven, he closes the bar. There’s no point, and he’s itching to get home. Of course he hopes Jo had a good time and that Harry is all Zayn and Gemma made him out to be, but there’s a small part of Louis waiting for this to crash and burn, and he kind of wants to see if he’s right. At this point, he’s pretty willing to offer that nanny position to Niall. He’ll pay him. Plus, come to think of it, Louis has no idea if Niall is even working right now.

Jobs are to Niall what dates are to Liam. They come and go frequently, and once again, Louis has no clue if this is just the way Niall likes to live his life or if in actuality he struggles holding onto a job. But while Louis can’t judge Liam for his dating habits, he can absolutely judge Niall for the job thing, because Louis has had this job for two years and doesn’t see himself going anywhere any time soon.

Despite the nice, gourmet dinner he’d been mentally preparing to make all night behind the bar, Louis decides instead on chicken nuggets and tater tots when he gets home. He’ll make it look nice, he figures. Crack out the finer china and maybe even offer Niall a glass of wine. At least he won’t burn anything or miss an ingredient or use the wrong seasoning; it’s pretty hard to get nugs and tots wrong.

But no matter his efforts, the entire front half of the house still smells like he burnt something when Niall and Jo get home. He _didn’t_ burn anything, so he assumes this means he’s got to clean his oven.

“Louis?” Niall calls from the doorway, sounding both confused and a little…urgent.

“Dinner is served,” Louis calls back.

Jo shouts, “Daddy!” sounding pleasantly surprised that he’s home early, and Louis turns his chair, prepares his position to catch her when she runs into his arms.

He sees the very top of her head first over the table, bobbing through the kitchen doorway as she hurries toward him. A second later, he takes in the scene before him silently.

Though it could not be seen from the top of her head, her hair is matted in blue frosting and mashed cake - cupcakes? The frosting is everywhere, smeared on her face and staining her pale yellow long-sleeved shirt. Her sleeves had been pushed up, and the only part of her that isn’t covered are her hands and wrists, like they’d recently been wiped up. The frosting is down her jeans, staining her socks.

What the _fuck_.

Louis stops her before she can leap into his arms. He holds her at shoulder’s length, examines her ruined clothes. Her hair. That’s going to take forever to properly wash out.

She didn’t seem to think anything was amiss though, instead cocking her head a little at Louis for stopping her. Blue eyes wide and not red-rimmed in the slightest, Jo looks…content. Like she’s been content all day. Hasn’t cried once.

Niall appears in the doorway now, but Louis can’t stop searching his daughter’s face for any indication something had gone wrong at daycare today.

“She came out of the house like that. That Styles guy just stood in the doorway and waved her off like nothing was wrong, didn’t even offer to send her home with a towel to sit on. That frosting better come off my f - my seats.”

“What…” Louis tries, but whatever he had been about to say is gone before he can complete the thought aloud. “Jo, what happened?” he asks instead.

She simply shrugs. What, is she sworn to secrecy? “Why are you covered in food?”

At this, a brilliant grin spreads across her face. “Food fight!”

“Food fight,” Louis breathes.

Niall sort of snorts and Louis glances at him, sees him look up toward the ceiling like he can’t believe what he’s hearing.

“Again!” Jo squeals. “Food fight again!”

“No, no,” Louis says, and his own voice sounds strange to him. He isn’t completely sure what he’s feeling, is the problem. Is he angry? Niall certainly is. That probably means he _should_ be. Normal dads would be.

Jo is happy though, the happiest he’s seen her after daycare ever. The importance of this isn’t lost on him, even if perhaps he should overlook it this time. But what does he do then? Allow her to think this kind of thing is acceptable as long as she has fun? It’s like the painting thing all over again. He wants her to express herself, but he doesn’t want her to think she can ruin walls and windows. Now he wants her to have fun and to sometimes break the rules to do it, but…how does he teach her _when_ to do that?

It suddenly dawns on him that it’s easier than he thought. She’s only three. Right now, at this age, he _doesn’t_ teach her that. He needs the authority figures in her life to know it.

“Niall, will you eat with her? I’m going to, uh…take a quick ride.”

“He might not be there. Jo was the last one; I can’t see him staying much longer. Don’t think he lives there.”

Louis isn’t really listening. If he’s not there, he’ll just go extra early tomorrow and it’ll be no big deal, but tonight would be preferable. He wants Harry Styles to start the new day with his head on straight. “Bathe her if you want, but if you don’t want to, I’ll be back eventually. Shouldn’t take long.”

“Lou, couldn’t this just wait until morning?”

Louis steps around Jo, slips past Niall toward the front door. He opens the closet there, retrieves his jacket and pulls it on. 

“Tonight’s the perfect time to do it, Ni. I imagine he’s got quite the mess to clean up,” Louis says, tying his boots. “He’ll be there.”

“Whatever,” Niall breathes. “All power to you.”

When Louis looks again, he sees that Jo had joined Niall in the kitchen doorway at some point. God, he hopes Niall bathes her for him.

Niall bends and hoists her into his arms, apparently with zero regard for his own clothes. “Come on, Jo,” he grunts. “Hungry?”

“For cake?” she asks, dimples flaring. When she teases, this always happens. Louis loves it about her.

“I think you’ve had enough cake,” Niall says as they disappear into the kitchen.

Louis ducks outside.

 

***

 

The daycare somehow looks different after nightfall, a little creepier, a little less ostentatious. Louis doesn’t know whether he prefers it as it is now or how it is in the daylight. Neither, he supposes.

On his way to the porch, Louis sees only one light on. It’s coming from the kitchen.

The swing door is locked, so he rings the doorbell instead of knocking. And it feels like he waits for a long time. Maybe Harry really is already gone. It’s of course possible he’s just left the light on. So Louis rings the bell once more, and if it’s not answered this time he’ll come back tomorrow.

But after a second, Louis hears the turn of a deadbolt, and when the main door cracks open and he can just barely make out Harry’s cautious face peering out at him, Louis lifts a hand and flashes his friendliest smile. They are strangers after all, and it’s a late enough hour that this visit could come off a bit strange. It suddenly occurs to him he maybe should have called first, asked for this meeting before just showing up.

As soon as Harry seems to recognize Louis, however, he pulls the door all the way open and begins fiddling with the screen door lock. It’s dark, but Louis sees a similar smile to his own through the screen and cloudy screen door window.

“Louis,” Harry says, pushing the door open enough that Louis can grab it himself. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

It’s a strange thing to say, Louis thinks, but he doesn’t let it derail him. “Hi. Can I come in? Was hoping we could have a chat.”

“Of course, yeah.” And he says it a little too quickly. Does he suffer from some sort of social issue or another? He seems to always be one step away from where he should be conversationally, always offbeat.

Louis follows him inside, and like he thought, the only light on is in the kitchen. Immediately there’s a stark contrast between Louis’ home and this house: one smells of burnt food currently and the other smells of a sugary sweetness - the same scent Jo had sported when she got home.

“Sorry, I’m just…tidying up,” Harry is saying, walking straight into the illuminated kitchen. _I’m sure you are_ , Louis thinks. “You actually caught me at the perfect time; I’m nearly finished. Probably would have gone home in a few minutes.”

“My timing is usually pretty impeccable.”

There is no evidence of a food fight in this kitchen apart from the smell. Louis pays close attention to the curtains and the rug by the sink - anywhere blue frosting would settle in and stain. Even Harry is spotless. Did he abstain from the fight or something? Wait on the sidelines to observe and declare the winner? Were there teams?

Louis thinks again of the laundry and stain removal he’s going to have to do and coughs in order to wipe his expression clean of any negative feelings he might be accidentally expressing. Because he really isn’t angry. A little irritated, yes, but again. Jo had enjoyed herself today by some miracle.

“Is that so?” Harry asks, opening a cupboard by the sink to put away the last of the clean dishes from the dishwasher. “Could have fooled me.” He finishes, pulls his face out from behind the cupboard door and tosses a half smile over his shoulder toward Louis. “Weren’t you late for work this morning?”

Well. “I suppose you’ve got me there.”

After Harry finishes closing up the dishwasher and turning off the extra light above the sink, he turns toward Louis. He’s wearing a strange expression that Louis can’t exactly place, and it’s frustrating because this isn’t the first time that’s happened. Earlier with the strange smile, now with _whatever_ look this is. It’s not an adult smile or any professional hello-I’m-the-stranger-taking-care-of-your-kid expression.

And because of both this and Louis’ certainty that Harry suffers from a social awkwardness of some sort, he isn’t surprised when seemingly out of the blue Harry suddenly crosses the kitchen and holds a hand out for Louis to shake.

“I know we’ve technically met already but we didn’t exactly get to do proper introductions,” he says. “I’m Harry Styles.”

Louis takes a good look at him. He knows his own eyes are a little squinted while he scrutinizes, but if Harry is allowed to make people slightly uncomfortable with his occasionally unorthodox ways of communicating, then Louis will be damned if he doesn’t allow himself to slip a little as well.

He’s got a mop for hair, this guy. A little too shaggy to be short, a little too unkept and erratic to be long. Louis can’t make out any clear sign of purposeful styling, so he can only assume it’s just accidentally that messy - perhaps Harry runs his hands through it a lot or something. Lots of volume, which is unfair.

He’s attractive, Louis supposes. He doesn’t like to admit it, but it’s not like he dislikes the guy. They hardly know each other. They’re re-introducing themselves because of lackluster _initial_ introductions for christ’s sake. Lackluster initial introductions that happened _this morning_.

His face isn’t symmetrical in the slightest, but that works in his favor somehow. His nose is weirdly shaped and his lips are an obscene ripe strawberry color, and all of these things Louis didn’t really notice until right now. He hadn’t exactly been looking this morning. Isn’t entirely sure why he’s looking now. He just wants to figure out what makes him so great, probably. Why did Gemma say everyone always loves him? What makes him different from the other daycare workers? Why the fuck does he think food fights are acceptable if he doesn’t plan to clean the kids up before sending them home?

So Louis takes Harry’s hand, immediately aware that it nearly swallows his own whole. Large hands. Great.

“I’m Louis,” he finally returns.

“I know. It’s nice to finally meet you.”

Louis’ examination of Harry’s voice will have to wait for another night. He simply doesn’t have the stamina for that feat right now. “Likewise.”

In touch with that social awkwardness of his, Harry holds onto Louis’ hand for a beat longer than was appropriate. When he lets go, he backs up a step and opens the fridge. “Can I get you anything to drink? I’ve got…apple juice, filtered water, and low fat milk.”

Louis’ lips twitch at that.

“Sorry. ‘M not positive, but I’m pretty sure it’s illegal to have alcohol here,” he continues, sheepish.

The hunched shoulders push Louis over some line and he chuckles, sitting himself at the kitchen table. “I’m good, thanks.”

Harry follows, mumbling another “Sorry,” like it’s personally his fault.

Louis waves a hand once this leaning tower of awkward facial expressions pulls out the chair across from him and sits. “Don’t worry about it, I shouldn’t be here too long. I just wanted to talk about Jo’s first day.”

Suddenly appearing nervous, Harry straightens. “Oh. She did really well. Got on great with the other kids, and I don’t think I had a single issue with her. Which is more than I can say about a couple of the others.”

None of this is surprising. “I’m glad to hear it. That’s not really what I wanted to talk about, though. See, the thing is - “

“The food fight, right?”

He looks less nervous now. More tired than anything.

“Yeah, I… See, we’ve had shit luck with daycares Jo’s entire life, I’ll be frank with you. She’s been to more than I’d like to admit, and she’s come home crying too often for someone who doesn’t deserve it, you know?”

“Of course,” Harry says quietly, resigned. Even his eyes are closing off, like a wall is falling in place that Louis hasn’t seen once since meeting him.

“And, I mean,” Louis laughs, “that didn’t happen today. This is the first time she’s come home genuinely…happy. She wanted to have _another_ food fight. So I guess the first thing I want to say to you about that entire ordeal is thank you. Seriously. I really mean it.”

The wall is gone again, like it hadn’t even come down in the first place. Still, Harry looks nothing but confused. Or in awe. Really, Louis can’t figure out his face whatsoever and begins to think he might as well stop trying. It’s useless.

“I - uh. You’re welcome.”

Louis holds out a hand again, and slowly, Harry takes it. “Anyone who can make my daughter smile like that is okay in my book.”

When they let go, Harry’s lips are in the shape of a small ‘o’, brows furrowed. They sit silently for a moment while Louis tries to figure out exactly how he wants to proceed with this now.

Before he can, Harry clears his throat. “You’re officially the first parent today to not bitch at me about this, you know.”

“Sorry?”

“The others only called, but still. Every single parent besides you called me to complain about the food fight. You’re the only one who didn’t. So when you showed up out front, I’ll be honest, I was a little worried.”

“You didn’t seem worried. You were…rather inviting once you saw who I was.” Louis remembers then what he had been thinking a few minutes ago. “Sorry, by the way, for _not_ calling. Before I showed up, that is. Bit rude of me.”

“I’m glad you didn’t,” Harry chuckles. “I honestly probably wouldn’t have answered, and then you wouldn’t have come.”

Right. “Yes, well. Here I am.”

That strange, beaming smile of his returns at that. His dimples flare, the same way Jo’s do when she teases, and a hollow jolt hits Louis in the pit of his stomach, right below his navel, at the sight of them. It’s cute when Jo does it, but when Harry does it it’s a little much. Much of what, he isn’t sure yet, doesn’t want to think about it right now. He still doesn’t plan to stay here very long.

“Anyway,” Louis tries, coughing again. “About that food fight though. As much as I appreciated it, I am wondering… Don’t you think maybe the other parents were pissed because you sent their kids home covered in blue frosting?”

“Why, were you?”

“I guess I wasn’t, no. I don’t know if I’ll ever get the stains out of her shirt or how long it’ll take to wash the cake out of her hair, but,” he shrugs. “Niall, on the other hand, said that if the frosting stained his car seat you owe him a clean.”

As quickly as he had loosened up, Harry’s shoulders hunch again. “Really? He said that? Shit. He’s right. You’re right, I shouldn’t have…”

It’s too easy. “I’m kidding. He didn’t say that.”

“Oh.”

“But that really probably is why the other parents are pissed. I’m, like…a _cool_ dad, so naturally I’m going to be more receptive to fun shit, you know? I get it. I get the appeal. I don’t care as much about a shirt.”

“A cool dad, huh? How old are you anyway?”

Louis raises a brow at that.

“If you don’t mind me asking,” Harry amends.

“Ask away. I’m twenty-eight. Why, do I look older? I’ve been working on the beard; ‘m not exactly sure how to wear it best, I mean on the one hand - “

“No, no, don’t worry. You look younger.”

Because he knew it would give him pause, Louis dramatically let his hands fall onto the table. In the silence of the house, the noise is alarmingly loud. “Really? Dammit. I’m trying to look older. The beard must not be working this way. Good to know, I guess. I’ll have to change it. Thanks for the advice.”

At this point, Harry is utterly lost. It’s the first expression that’s been plainly displayed on his face. “I’m…you’re welcome? Wait.” He folds his arms on the table and leans forward. “Why do you want to come off older? I’ve never once heard anyone in their late twenties say that. Never.”

“I’m a young single dad and people stare because of that.” Louis shrugs. “It’s uncomfortable. “The older I look, the less they stare. Well, unless I’m suddenly gray and wrinkly. Then they’ll stare because a cute grandpa’s out with his granddaughter, you know? It’s cute then. So there’s a limit, of course, to my madness. Why, how old are you? Wait, let me guess.”

Louis feels playful. He doesn’t know why - it’s kind of abrupt. But talking to Harry is easier than he thought it’d be, and he finds himself indulging too many tangents. Despite being aware of this, however, he can’t control it. And to his surprise, he doesn’t exactly want to control it.

“Mmm…twenty-three?”

Harry’s grinning again. “Wrong.”

“Twenty-two?”

A chuckle. “Getting colder. Come on, I can’t look that young.”

“So twenty-four?”

An amused eye roll. “You’re bad at this.”

“Twenty-five, final guess. I refuse to go higher than that - I’m already convinced you’re lying.”

Harry lets out a full laugh at that; it’s a loud noise and completely unexpected. He hasn’t exactly been super reserved thus far, but he’s never laughed like this. He seems aware of this fact too, and as soon as he does it he presses a few fingers against his lips as if to stifle any future outbursts. He mumbles around his fingers, “Twenty-five. Not lying.”

Louis shakes his head. “You have a very young face. Maybe it’s the struggle ‘stache you’ve got going on there.”

This is the last thing Harry must expect Louis to say. His eyes widen and his hand falls away from his mouth so that his lips can part. “Excuse me?”

“Sorry, Harry. I only speak the truth.”

“Yeah? Mr. Impeccable Timing?”

And now Louis is grinning. “Yeah.”


	3. III

Louis wakes in the middle of the night to the weirdest dream. Harry’s in it, but that isn’t the weird part. The weird part is that Jo wasn’t.

He hardly slept after that, so when he wakes again to his alarm, the last thing he wants to do is get out of bed. But unlike in his ludicrous dream, he has a daughter and she’s probably already awake. If he stays in bed any longer, god only knows what kind of mischief she’ll get into. Especially after that food fight yesterday.

As he drags himself to Jo’s room, he wonders if he ever did get around to telling Harry there’s a time and place for such things. Now he can’t remember. They talked for so long, and he _thinks_ most of it was about that food fight, but fuck if he can actually be sure.

Like he knew she would be, Jo is already awake, pretend-painting her window again. She doesn’t react to him, and he stays there in her doorway watching her. He should get her an easel for her birthday. Or maybe for Easter. Her birthday isn’t until September. Then she could actually paint.

When he finally joins her, it’s to fall into her small bed while she continues pretend-painting. He doesn’t say anything and neither does she, and she doesn’t stop what she’s doing. So he watches her for as long as he can before his eyelids begin to droop and his limbs feel too heavy to move. “Jo, don’t let me fall asleep,” he thinks he mumbles.

She doesn’t respond, probably didn’t even hear him. And he falls asleep.

When he wakes for the third time, he isn’t alone. He hadn’t been asleep for long this time - at least he doesn’t think so - but Jo had relocated anyway from her window to his side at some point and had chosen to lie with him. She’s asleep now, her small head using his more outstretched arm as a pillow. He reaches over and moves a strand of hair from her eyelashes, carefully putting it back in its place.

People always say she looks just like him, but at this angle there is no denying she looks exactly like his mum. It’s weird to say, so he usually doesn’t, but it’s as though all of her looks skipped him completely and went straight to Jo. She has the hair and the pouty lips - they’re small yet, but he sees them fleshing out into his mum’s, so distinct and specific to her that Lottie had them tattooed onto her arm after she died. Along with the lips, she has the hair. Louis’ hair is brown too, sure, but it’s straight as a ruler. Jo’s alternates between wavy and curly, depending on the day, and it grows like a weed. He’s met other three-year-olds, and not a one has hair like hers. It’s insane. Louis needed Lottie to teach him how to French braid just to keep it out of her face sometimes, because even pony tails aren’t always enough.

It’s in her eyes, too. Mostly in her eyes is where Louis sees it, really. They’re definitely his mum’s eyes. He looks over to the framed photograph on Jo’s nightstand just to be sure, but he already knows.

His movement must have jostled Jo enough, because it’s then that she awakens.

“I said not to let me fall asleep,” he tells her after a few bleary blinks.

She sits up and rubs at her eyes, and then she’s climbing over Louis to get off her bed. With a groan, Louis follows - not because he wants to, but because if he doesn’t feed her she’ll feed herself, and he doesn’t exactly plan to give her free reign over their pantry and fridge after yesterday.

It’s while he’s pouring her a bowl of cereal that he decides he won’t be going to work today. He texts Liam to change the sign on the barroom doors so that guests would know, and then he texts Niall that he has the day off. While he’s pouring his _own_ bowl of cereal, he gets a phone call.

“What’s up?” Niall asks him.

“Exhausted is all. I think I might take Jo out and do something fun, I don’t know.”

“Right. Actually, Louis, do you think I could steal her tonight anyway?”

Louis pauses in the middle of wiping up some milk Jo has spilled on the table. “What? Why?”

“Yer going to laugh.”

“Probably. But explain anyway.”

“I wanted to take her grocery shopping.”

It’s honestly so absurd that Louis can’t even laugh. “Please continue.”

Niall sighs. “I need her to be my wing woman. At the grocery store.”

“You want to use my three-year-old child as bait since you’re incapable of attracting women yourself? At a grocery store?”

“Exactly. Look, I obviously can’t take her to a bar with me, so the grocery store is the next best thing. Just because you aren’t interested in dating right now doesn’t mean I’m not. I don’t need you to make me feel stupid about this, because it’s not stupid. It’s genius.”

Now Louis is laughing. Jo blinks at him. “Stupid genius. Also, I take offense to that. Who ever said I wasn’t interested in dating? I date.”

“Louis. No you don’t.”

“I absolutely do. I date all the time.”

“Lame-o or whatever his name is doesn’t count.”

Louis snorts. “It’s Liam, and I’m not talking about him.”

“Whatever. And no you don’t. Anyway, back to why I _really_ called. So can I take her?”

Jo spills milk again. Louis sighs and reaches over to wipe it up. “When?”

“I don’t know, six-ish?”

The problem is that Louis took off of work in order to spend time with Jo. Without her here, he technically has no plans and he might as well have no plans at work, behind the bar where he’s at least making money. But he just really doesn’t want to go to work today, doesn’t want to deal with the men from the construction crew (or anyone over the age of thirty for that matter). He guesses he’ll have to figure out something else to do. Maybe he’ll clean the house. Maybe he’ll…go get a haircut or something.

“Fine.”

“Great. You owe me anyway.”

Isn’t that the truth. Louis rolls his eyes. “Whatever you say. Goodbye, Niall.”

“See you at six!”

 

***

 

When Louis parks outside the daycare at seven that evening, he isn’t completely sure what finally drove him to come.

The thing is, he’s been thinking about this almost all day, partially because Harry somehow made it into his dreams last night and partially because - somehow, to Louis’ immense surprise - they got on _really_ well the night before. At the very least, Louis thinks they can get to chatting again. He’ll kill an hour or two, and hopefully by then Niall will be finished parading his child around a grocery store and they can both go to bed early.

But Louis knows he isn’t exactly here to chat, which is why he digs his fingernails into his palms as he once again climbs the porch steps and rings the doorbell. He doesn’t even check to see if the swing door is locked; he just assumes it is.

He should have called first. Again. He really must start remembering to do that.

Harry doesn’t take as long to open the door this time, and he pulls it open all the way rather than just a crack. In the dark of the evening and the shadows of the unlit room behind him looming, slinking over his shoulders and curling around the tips of his perpetually messy hair, Louis can only barely decipher the recognition in his eyes.

Harry doesn’t seem surprised to see him there.

“Louis Tomlinson,” he says lowly once the screen door is unlocked and he’s pushed it open. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

The way the word ‘pleasure’ rolls off his tongue is obscene, and Louis swallows thickly before he can respond.

“Are you free tonight?” he blurts before he can’t.

Harry folds his arms across his chest and leans against the doorway. He’s got an eyebrow raised in a way that makes Louis think he isn’t aware he’s doing it. Or maybe he is. Louis can never be sure.

“I’m free every day,” Harry responds, for the first time not missing a beat. “It’s in the constitution.”

Louis narrows his eyes, couldn’t stop his lips from spreading into an amused, tight-lipped smile although he certainly tries. “ _Grease 2_. Wow. I’m impressed.”

That beaming grin of Harry’s appears, clearly visible even in the darkness. He pushes off the door frame and reaches somewhere behind him, all without breaking eye contact (eye contact that Louis can’t believe he’s been maintaining). He had retrieved his jacket.

Still without breaking eye contact, Harry steps out onto the porch now, pulling the door shut behind him. This movement brings him less than a foot away from Louis, arms raised above his head as he pulls his jacket on, which makes him seem larger than he really is.

Louis can tell Harry knows exactly what he’s doing, is very aware of their proximity and perhaps did it intentionally.

Discreetly, Louis stumbles half a step back but can go no further without very obviously falling down the first porch step.

“So,” Harry says, voice still low. Is he doing that on purpose? “What’d you have in mind?”

 

***

 

As much as Louis hates to admit it, he knows Niall had been right about his dating life - that it’s non-existent. So whether this is to purely spite his friend or because he actually likes Harry enough, Louis doesn’t know, but here they are.

He’s not very original; they’ve gone to Louis’ favorite bar in town (not his own; it’s closed), and even though he wanted to come away from it able to call it a date, he’s making it hard, he knows. Sure, they’ve been chatting and getting on all night, just like last time, but…he doesn’t know. He’ll probably still go home and tell Niall it was a date regardless.

The bar is dimly-lit, but Louis can see Harry more clearly now than he could at the daycare. And maybe it’s the drinks in him already, but yeah, okay. Harry is hot. _Really_ hot. Anything about his face that Louis might have thought odd before now seems fake, like Louis had just been making excuses to avoid admitting how attractive this guy is.

And his body language makes it feel like a real date, at least. He’s been angled toward Louis all night on his barstool, one knee bumping Louis’ thigh whenever the stool spins a certain direction. He’s good at body language, Harry is. Louis is intimidated by it because he isn’t.

“Wasn’t there something - and correct me if I’m wrong - “ Louis is saying. “Wasn’t there something you were trying to tell me yesterday morning while I was hurrying off? I could’ve sworn - “

“Oh _yeah_ ,” Harry nods. “Yeah. I was just going to offer to let Jo stay later, if you wanted. I don’t know if your friend, the Irish one, picks her up for a specific reason or anything but I mean if it’d be easier for you both, I…I don’t mind staying open later for her - er, for you. And your friend. I’m sorry. I can’t remember his name.”

Well, this is unexpected. “I couldn’t ask that of you, I mean. I work pretty late. Midnight most nights, usually nine or ten if I’m lucky. And it’s Niall.”

“Niall,” Harry says like he’s actively committing it to memory in that very moment. “Where do you work?”

“A hotel. I run the bar - it’s the only job I like doing.”

“Do you have a choice? Isn’t it like, you apply for a specific position and then that’s the one you do?” he snorts. “You make it sound like you had the pick of the litter.”

Before Louis even realizes what he’s confiding, he shrugs. “I technically did considering I’m my own boss.”

Harry raises his brows and sits back a little. “So you manage it?”

“Eh. Manage it, own it. Something like that, yeah.”

At this, Harry completely spins his barstool in a circle with his arms raised. When he’s facing Louis again, he begins to say something but a loud old rock song blares over the speakers at the same time and he has to start again, leaning closer to Louis’ ear so that he can be heard. Louis ducks toward him to accommodate him as best he can. “I don’t know why I’m surprised. You certainly seem the type.” When he pulls back to gage Louis’ reaction, his lips are curled into a mischievous grin.

Louis shouts, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

And Harry shrugs, clearly toying with him. “I’ll tell you later.” He stands after that, stepping around his bar stool and setting a hand on Louis’ shoulder. Again, he bends to speak into Louis’ ear. “After I use the restroom.”

Before he can walk away fully, Louis spins to face him. “Unbelievable.”

He spins on his heel to back away, and one side of his lips quirk upwards. “What can I say? That’s my M-O.” And then he’s gone, swallowed by the throngs of people here celebrating somebody’s birthday or something. Louis turns back to his drink and sighs with a small shake of his head.

He’s not drunk and doesn’t want to get to that point, but he’s feeling the buzz just enough that he might actually be enjoying himself. And that’s not really surprising or anything, because he already knows he and Harry can hold a conversation. But he isn’t worried about the amount of eye contact they’ve been making or how close their faces occasionally end up. Though talking is about all they’re doing, he thinks it’s okay to call it a date. To Niall. Maybe to Harry this isn’t a date, and that’s fine - Louis won't pretend this is a thing he believes will progress or anything, but to have fun every once in a while? Yeah. Harry might be able to overlook Louis' single-dad status for that..

The bar stool on his other side that was once empty suddenly isn’t. He pays whoever it is no mind - there are a lot of people here, and there are only so many bar stools to sit in - but they don’t have the same idea. After a moment, an elbow not-so-accidentally slid into his on the bartop. Louis looks.

It’s a guy, a little older than Louis probably but nobody he’s seen before. Most likely here with that party. Louis comes here often enough that he can spot a regular. This guy is different, even dresses differently than people in this area do, sort of in a high fashion way even though his outfit is simple. Half of his bleached hair is long enough to be tucked behind an ear; the other half is buzzed off. He’s got a cheek propped on a fist while he looks back at Louis, and before Louis can think to say anything about the elbow bump, he’s smiling.

“Hello. Do you come here often?”

It’s the oldest line in the book, is what that is. If Louis wasn’t polite, he’d have rolled his eyes. Instead, he offers a smile in return, the most adult one he’s worn in the last two days. “I do, actually. The jukebox is behind you to your left, and the bathroom is behind you to your right. Bartender’s name is Allen; he’ll also answer to Al.”

When Louis turns back to his drink, angled even a little towards Harry’s empty spot, he rolls his eyes to himself. Great.

“Cute _and_ funny. Am I glad I came to your end of the bar,” the guy croons to Louis’ shoulder. “I’m Gabe.”

Louis grits his teeth and reluctantly turns back toward him. “Hi. Look. I appreciate the compliments, but I’m waiting for someone.”

At that, his sly smile grows and he gestures to himself. “And I’ve arrived.” When Louis doesn’t respond, he adds, “No, but seriously, I mean. Whoever you’re waiting for isn’t here, so maybe you’re waiting on the wrong person.”

“Or he’s in the bathroom.”

“Sorry, can’t hear you over the music,” Gabe says immediately, though he obviously can hear just fine. But it gives him an excuse to lean forward toward Louis, who jerks backward. “Try that again?”

“Look - “

“Hey,” Harry says, dropping another hand onto Louis’ shoulder from behind as he slides back onto his barstool. “Sorry, I got distracted by some of the wall art in that back hallway. Anyway, where were we - oh.”

Without looking, Louis knows Harry’s just noticed their new guest. Out of Gabe’s line of sight, Louis reaches behind him and touches Harry’s forearm. He doesn’t even know himself exactly what he’s trying to silently tell him, but he hopes Harry will pick up on the situation through it.

“Look, mate,” Louis tries again, speaking louder to avoid any more unnecessary closeness. “Again, I’m flattered, but…” he gestures toward Harry. “Sorry.”

Somehow, this man is undeterred. The new smile on his face almost makes Louis wince. “Right,” Gabe says. “Nice to meet you,” he directs at Harry, eyes zeroing in on him like a scope searching for a target. “I’m Gabe.”

He says it the same way he said it to Louis moments ago, uses the same, weird voice, and this is… This annoys Louis more than it did the first time. It gets worse when Gabe slinks off his stool and closer to Louis, all the while keeping his gaze locked on Harry. He sets a hand on Louis’ shoulder, the one Harry hadn’t touched, and leans into him like they’re good friends and Louis is playing wingman.

Which…won’t do at all.

“Do _you_ come here often?” Gabe asks him, and just. No.

“Uh, no.” Harry’s eyes flicker between Louis and Gabe, clearly lost. “No, it’s my first time here.”

Louis’ over it. “Okay, that’s enough.” He hops off his stool, shrugging his shoulder to rid it of Gabe’s hand, and steps between him and Harry. Facing the former, he backs up a step until he can feel Harry’s knees brushing either side of his hips, and to probably everyone’s surprise (no one more than Louis himself), he sets a hand possessively on Harry’s lower thigh. “We’re here together, we’re leaving together, and neither of us are interested. Please leave us alone.”

Finally, that stupid look drips off Gabe’s face and he looks at Louis with utter disdain. Without a word, he leaves them both with a parting glare, disappearing back into the crowd from which he came. Louis doesn’t take his hand off Harry’s thigh until he’s positive Gabe isn’t coming back. Once he’s sure, he exhales sharply through his nose and turns around to apologize, already knowing he’d been way out of line. He hadn’t given Harry the chance to respond to that guy at all, and well, for all Louis knew perhaps he would have _wanted_ to be hit on by that guy. Whether Louis had liked what had been happening or not, he should have bitten his tongue. Like usual.

“I’m sorry - “

“Leaving together, huh?” Harry asks before he can finish, a brow raised. That mischievous smile of his is back, only it’s different than it was before.

Louis flushes, just then realizing how that sounds. “I meant - “

Harry shrugs, slowly sliding back off the stool. He stands, right there, much closer to Louis than he had been when sitting, and thanks to Louis’ possessiveness they’d already been quite close. “I didn’t realize, but I’m not opposed.”

“I was - I’m. I mean, I - “ Louis tries again, to no avail. Dammit. It’s dark enough in here, sure, but he knows he’s blushing.

“You’re good at playing it cool, though, I must admit,” Harry continues.

They’re so close. Louis has to look up, just a little, and yeah, he definitely isn’t buzzed enough for this conversation or this…way that they’re standing together. But as distracted as he is, he does notice a certain twinkle, or a gleam of some sort in Harry’s eyes. They are…he’s teasing. That’s it. He’s totally bullshitting right now. Louis grins. “Yeah, well. It’s my M-O.”

Harry grins back. “Is that right.” It’s not a question.

And fuck. Louis doesn’t want him to be teasing right now. Not with the way his entire body is warming, the way his body itches to close what little distance actually remains between them. There’s this weird feeling in the pit of his stomach he doesn’t even know the last time he’s felt, and sure, it’s been _too_ long since his sex life has last seen the light of day - or the light of the moon, more accurately. Just tonight. He wants this just tonight.

So Louis breathes, “Yeah,” and Harry probably doesn’t hear it over the music, but they’re close enough and he’s been staring at Louis’ lips for a full minute now. Louis’ sure he understands. And then he adds, completely on a whim, “So, I’d give you the classic ‘your place or mine,’ but mine might be a bad idea for obvious reasons.”

Once it’s out, Louis prepares himself for two different responses. The first is eager and wordless - the emptying of a pocket, money left on the bar for a tip, never breaking eye contact as they both make their exit. The second is perfect comedic timing - Harry’s loud, genuine laugh and the perfect comeback without missing a beat. They’ll both order another drink and get back to talking about whatever they had been talking about before.

Still, despite preparing himself for it, Louis doesn’t realize what Harry is doing until after he tips the bartender enough for the two of them. “I don’t know if I should be impressed or embarrassed you beat me to it."

“Beat you to what?”

There’s the slightest touch, beneath his jacket but still above his T-shirt on his hip, only for a moment as Harry says in his ear, “Suggesting we relocate.”

Louis’ ears ring at the thought that Harry had been thinking about this all along, but he doesn’t let himself get too hung up on it right now. Instead, he turns, following the ghost of that hip touch as Harry walks ahead of him toward the bar’s exit.

 

***

 

Harry lives on a street Louis’ never been down before in a part of the neighborhood he’s otherwise familiar with. Liam lives in a small yellow house his grandmother had left for him when she moved into an old folks’ home a few years ago, so Louis’ been told, one street over. He’s only been there a couple times.

Louis feels awkward. Harry’s done nothing wrong and he kept Louis laughing and talking the entire ride here, but Louis isn’t drunk enough to be able to pretend he’s this kind of guy. He doesn’t do one night stands, even before he had Jo, and he isn’t sure how to be that guy now. And with Jo’s daycare supervisor? Is that even allowed?

But he doesn’t let any of these doubts stop him as he follows Louis down the little cobblestone path leading to Harry’s front door. Somewhere between the driveway and here Louis’ hand had slipped into Harry’s, their fingers sloppily threading together as they continue walking, and once they reach the door Louis squeezes it. “Is someone else home, or do you make a habit of leaving your lights on?”

Through the glass panes on the door, they can see a room somewhere in the house different from every other room visible from the front windows. When Harry sees the light, he presses his lips together, pausing with his hand on the door handle. “Fuck. I should have texted him.”

“Him?”

“Zayn. My roommate.”

Zayn. _Zayn._ “You guys are roommates?” Louis asks, trying to keep quiet. “You know he referred me to the daycare, right? Well, through Liam.”

Harry blinks and doesn’t say anything at first. Then, “ _You’re_ Liam’s friend he’s been on about?”

“You’ve met him? And what?”

A short laugh bursts through his lips, and he makes a face like he didn’t expect his own reaction. “He’s been around a couple times, yeah. Keeps saying I should meet his friend, he knows just the _greatest_ guy, I’d get on _so_ well with him. You get the point. I can't believe he was talking about you.”

Louis shakes his head and has to look away for a second. He can’t believe it either, that Liam has been saying these things. He’s not mad, he just…can’t believe it. They’re friends, yes, but Louis wouldn’t consider them _that_ close. Maybe Liam does? Maybe Louis should hang out with him more outside of work? Be a better friend to him overall?

“Listen,” Harry says now, stepping closer to Louis. They’re still outside the front door, still not going inside. Louis is eye level with Harry’s mouth, and it makes it hard to concentrate, but he forces himself to meet his somewhat intense gaze. His eyes are searching, but Louis can’t tell for what. “I know we barely know each other, and I know that’s how all of these sorts of conversations start.” He rolls his eyes at himself, and Louis giggles - he _giggles_. “But it kind of feels like fate, and I think we had a really good time tonight and I hope you won’t say no if I ask you to follow me into the shed in our backyard.”

He can’t control himself any longer - Louis busts out laughing, quickly realizes what he’s done and slaps a hand over his own mouth. “Seriously?”

Harry somehow manages to remain in character. He nods once. “I’ve never been more serious.”

“Is it a heated shed? It’s kind of cold - “

“We’ll be plenty warm.”

“Harry.”

“Is that a no?”

Louis nudges one of Harry’s brown boot toes with the toe of his own trainer. “No. I just don’t know that fate wants us to fuck in a shed tonight, is all.”

Harry grins. He reaches for Louis slowly, catches his waist and slowly slides his hands around to the small of Louis’ back. He uses that grip as leverage to pull Louis even closer, and pressed against each other like this, Louis’ knees shake. Doesn’t help that they’re both hard and now they both know this about the other. “What about this?” Harry asks, almost against Louis’ lips. The tips of their noses touch. “Does fate want this?”

He doesn’t feel awkward anymore. He grips Harry’s unzipped jacket, pulls him closer yet. But then he waits, doesn’t say or do anything for a few seconds because he isn’t usually the one who gets teased - he does the teasing. Harry’s smile manages to slowly grow the entire time, and when it looks like it can’t get any larger, Louis mumbles, “Kiss me, you fool.”

And Harry does. It’s like someone has flipped a switch, though, and Louis’ reaction to it is not one he had been expecting. His knees buckle, but between his grip on Harry’s jacket and Harry’s grip on him, he doesn’t go anywhere. Louis relinquishes all control here; he may do the teasing, but Harry is _good_ at this. Really good, and Louis is more than willing to sit back and enjoy it. It’s a hard kiss, like they’ve been desperate and holding back for hours (maybe Harry has been?), open-mouthed and teeth occasionally clashing together. Harry whimpers once or twice, and Louis wants to stay there and continue doing this forever, even though he can’t breathe.

Neither of them hear the door open at all. Louis hears someone clear their throat, then cough; Harry doesn’t.

“Hey, man,” a small, beautiful guy - Zayn - now standing before them in the open doorway says, presumably to Harry.

Harry, sort of panting, lips puffy, looks between Zayn and Louis a few times before he thinks to respond. As if he can’t catch his breath enough to speak, he just dips his head, acknowledging the greeting.

“Want me to leave?” Zayn asks, his expression void of any alarm or amusement. “I can go to Liam’s.”

Harry looks to Louis again, and Louis doesn’t know what to say so he doesn’t say anything. “Uh,” Harry tries, returning his gaze to his roommate. “That’d be great.”

“Cool.” For a second, Zayn steps back inside. He reemerges with a jacket and slippers. Without another word, he steps out, right between them, and gives Harry a nod. When he turns to Louis, he touches his upper arm for a moment. “Nice to finally meet you. Glad to see you two hit it off.”

“Yeah,” is Louis’ eloquent response.

They watch Zayn go, watch him until he’s crossing the road to the sidewalk, bringing his phone to his ear. Probably calling Liam. Louis is catching his breath still, sort of unable to believe that just happened. When he finally looks at Harry, Harry’s already staring at him. Shy now, Louis silently lets Harry take his hand and slowly lead him inside. The only light on in the house comes from a room in the opposite direction from the one Harry takes him in. They move carefully and quietly down a dark hallway, almost like Zayn is still here and they’re sneaking in. Louis follows him closely, afraid he’ll trip over something or run into a wall if he doesn’t step exactly where Harry steps, do exactly as Harry does.

Eventually, Harry pulls Louis into a room even darker than the hallway had been. He stumbles into Harry’s back, which he can’t see anymore, and without flipping on a light Harry turns Louis around.

“Is there a light?” Louis whispers. He doesn’t know why he whispers.

Hands on Louis’ waist, Harry gently pushes him backwards. “There is.”

“Will we be using it?”

Harry’s lips are on his again, just for a moment, and then they’re on Louis’ neck even as they both continue to move further into the room. “Eventually.”

Finally, Louis’ heels bump into Harry’s bed, and he falls backwards onto it. There’s a lot of fumbling around because neither of them can see shit. Louis clambers further onto the bed, and Harry helps, a strong arm wrapping around his body and easily moving him. And then, while breaking off the kiss to do it, Harry removes his shirt. Louis can feel heat radiating off this bare torso hovering above him, and he thinks that maybe they _would_ have been plenty warm in that shed.

When Louis’s cold hands press against the hot skin of Harry’s chest for the first time, Harry sucks in a breath. It’s a wet sound, and Louis wants to die. Then Harry’s fingers are sliding up Louis’ stomach, up his chest, taking his own T-shirt with them. Once _his_ shirt is gone, they’re frantic, both reaching for each other’s pants and tugging and kicking them off once they’re unbuttoned. Harry’s are harder, the tight, second layer of skin that they are, and when they get stuck around his ankles they both break the heated silence by cracking up.

And Louis gets it now, gets why Harry hasn’t turned on the lights. It’s fun and mysterious, and they’re touching and kissing things they can’t see. Louis feels like a teenager this way, and he doesn’t know what it is about Harry Styles that makes him wish he was still in uni, could still do this every single night. Because he wants to do this every single night.

It’s a good thing Zayn left, because Louis has a hard time keeping quiet by the time Harry takes him into his mouth. He doesn’t last long and doesn’t even care, feels stars in his toes begin to shoot up his legs, up his spine, almost immediately. When he returns the favor, Harry doesn’t keep quiet either, but he stops Louis before he can finish.

“Kiss me,” he wants instead, voice lower and thicker than usual.

So Louis does, crawls up the bed for Harry to grab both sides of his face and press their lips together. Louis lets his hand trail back down Harry’s stomach. He wraps it around Harry’s length - his entire body shudders, though Louis isn’t positive which one of them had really done it - and tugs slowly, almost lazily until Harry gasps and then whimpers into Louis’ mouth. While Harry rides it out, Louis kisses down his jaw, over his neck, across his right collarbone. One of their bodies shudders again - maybe both of them.

After a while, Louis settles in there, tucked into the crook beneath Harry’s arm and pressed against his side. He’s got his chin resting on that collarbone of Harry’s he’d just been kissing, and he still can’t see a single thing in the dark but he pretends he can. He pretends he’s looking at the underside of Harry’s jaw, at the barely-there, patchy stubble. He pretends Harry notices and adjusts so that he can peer down at him. He pretends the eye contact proves to be too much after all this and blushes, looks away.

“This is fun,” he says softly, the first time either of them have spoken in a while.

“I knew it would be, the second I first saw you.”

Louis snorts. “You thought about fucking me when we first met? As I dropped my three-year-old off at your doorstep?”

He feels Harry shrug. “Fate hasn’t failed me yet.”

“You didn’t know it was fate until I told you I knew Liam.”

“I knew it was fate,” he counters immediately. “But I didn’t think _you_ would until then. Until we were connected in more ways than just…me thinking the stranger who showed up my first day on the job looked more attractive than any single dad has any right to be.”

“You thought I was hot?”

“It’s hard to explain. It feels like I thought you were more than that, right from the word go. But, I mean, yes, I also thought you were hot.”

Louis giggles again, and really, he hates this new development. This giggling thing. “You’re hot too, I guess.”

“We’re both really fucking hot. Glad we’re in agreement there.”

“Oh, but about the daycare.” A thought has suddenly occurred to Louis, and although he doesn’t exactly like to bring up Harry’s occupation which involves children while they’re lying in bed naked and post-fuck, he has to ask before he forgets. “Did you really mean what you said earlier? At the bar?”

“I meant everything I said. But which thing are you referring to specifically?”

Louis rolls his eyes. “The thing about staying open later.”

“Oh.” Harry lifts himself from the bed, pushing up into a seated position. Louis sits up as well, and a second later, a dim lamp on the nightstand beside the bed clicks on. “Yeah, I meant that. Also, hi.” He smiles at Louis, and this is the most interesting smile he’s ever seen on him, the first of its kind and one Louis hopes to see more often after tonight. It’s a little reserved, a little shy, but knowing and raw, and it’s followed by a quick, sweet kiss.

“Hi,” he says softly against Harry’s lips before he can pull back again. “I…want to take you up on that. With a trial run, of course.”

“A trial run?”

“Yeah. We’ll try it one night and then see how it goes, and then…and then we go from there. See how Jo feels about it.”

Harry’s hair is the very definition of sex hair, but as he nods through Louis’ explanation, Louis wants nothing more than to run his fingers through it and mess it up even more. He doesn’t want to get dressed and say goodbye to that hair, doesn’t want to go home.

“Bring it on,” Harry finally says. “Plus, we can food fight all we want then, long after the others leave. If you thought she was a mess the other day, just you wait. You’ve seen nothing yet.”

“I take it back, I don’t like this plan.”

“Tomorrow, then?”

Louis sighs, crawling forward and then throwing a leg over Harry’s lap to straddle him. “Fine,” he says, already getting hard again from this position. “Tomorrow. Now, before I have to tragically return home and relieve Niall of his nanny duties, let’s try this again with the lights on.”

 

***

 

Of course the one time Louis really, really wants the bar to be dead is the time they have a lot of walk-ins and almost all of them relocate from their rooms to the bar around seven. They had even asked Louis to stay open later, and he actually had to take a second before responding to remind himself that, “How about you all fuck off to a different bar?” is not an acceptable answer.

So by twelve-thirty, he’s finally texting Harry that he’s waiting on the porch. He doesn’t want to ring the doorbell or knock in case Jo is sleeping somewhere where she’d hear it, so he waits.

When Harry opens the door, he’s already smiling. There’s a moment when neither of them do anything, just stand there on either side of the threshold and smile at each other like idiots who forgot how to communicate. Louis wants to kiss him but doesn’t know if that’d be weird, and Harry looks like a child who just found out his parents are taking him to Disney World. And neither of them say a word.

Eventually, Louis can’t take it anymore and clears his throat. “Hi. How’d it go?”

“Hi,” Harry says slowly, his voice low in a way that reminds Louis of last night. Heat creeps up the back of his neck. “It was great. She’s asleep in one of the guest rooms down the hall.” He steps aside. “Come here. I want to show you something.”

Louis does as he’s told, slipping into the dark front room and shutting the door behind him. While he’s doing that, Harry goes on ahead, disappearing into the kitchen as Louis removes his jacket. He doesn’t know if he’ll stay long, but whatever. Just in case.

“So, what’s up?” Louis whispers, following Harry's footsteps into the kitchen. When he doesn’t get an answer, he asks, “Harry?” and steps further inside.

“Now!” Louis hears a familiar little girl shout, and then before he can fully process what’s happening, something soft and sweet pelts his face, half on his eye and half on his cheekbone.

His lips part in surprise, and he freezes. Slowly, he reaches up to wipe frosting out of his eye so that he can open it, and when he does he sees a ruined cupcake at his feet. There is blue frosting on his shoe.

When he finally looks up, Harry and Jo are ducking behind one of the counters, a pan of colorfully-frosted cupcakes in front of them - more than just blue this time. Louis can only see their eyes, but it’s enough to know that they’re both smiling widely, impatiently awaiting his reaction. And he’s…he isn’t even a little mad. He wants to _laugh_ , can’t believe he actually fell for this.

Out of the corner of his eye, then, he spots it: another pan of cupcakes, waiting for him on the kitchen table.

“Wow,” he finally says, fighting to keep a straight face. “This is…unexpected.”

Neither of them react. He takes a casual step forward, angled slightly toward the table. Harry doesn’t miss this motion. He whispers into Jo’s ear, and she quickly reaches for another cupcake and then pulls it behind the counter with her. After a second, she disappears entirely. Louis hears her snicker softly to herself, somewhere down by Harry’s feet.

“But if we must…” Louis continues, and then as fast as he can, he darts forward, snatches a cupcake, and whips it in Harry’s direction.

“Jo, now!” Harry shouts, dodging Louis’ admittedly bad throw and grabs a cupcake of his own.

Louis is distracted, readying himself to swerve Harry’s missile that he doesn’t notice his own daughter closing in on him before it’s too late and she’s close enough to hit him square in the chest with a pink one.

“Now you’ve done it,” he says to her, reaching for two cupcakes this time and tossing them both at her - less forceful than the one he threw at Harry.

She squeals, one of the cupcakes sticking in her hair and the other catching her in the neck. She turns and runs back to Harry, who’s already reloaded and begins firing at Louis. Cupcake after cupcake comes his way, and he can’t possibly dodge all of them. Jo joins in eventually, and it’s two against one in a war Louis simply doesn’t intend to lose.

He grabs his entire pan and runs headlong into the line of fire, one forearm shielding his arm and the other protecting his ammo. When he reaches them, Jo hiding and giggling behind Harry’s legs, he does the only thing he can think of and dumps the whole pan over both of them.

Harry lets out one of his bellowing laughs, the real, deep one that sometimes sounds like a honking goose. Jo is still giggling, still squealing, and still hiding behind Harry, though she peers up at Louis from between those long legs. She has bits of cupcake and some yellow frosting in her eyelashes.

And then Harry takes the last cupcake from their pan, a purple one, and bumps it against Louis’ lips and nose. Jo claps like she’s proud of him, so Louis catches Harry’s wrist - the one with the rest of that cupcake - and brings it up to Harry’s own nose. Less gently, he smashes it against that pretty face, also to Jo’s delight.

Louis considers kissing it off, but before he can make the move, Harry beats him to it.

**Author's Note:**

> Yay, okay, I'll try to keep this short.
> 
> Fate Chances Moonlight (title from "Face Dances, Pt. 2" by Pete Townshend) is inspired by the following prompt: "the new nursery worker Harry is not at all what single dad Louis was expecting." The fic is for the 1D for Olds 2018 Galentines Fic Exchange, and it's the first time I've finished something in actual ages so I want to seriously thank Alessandra and Sam for putting this together and being perfect mods. It was fun to write again even though I did not sleep whatsoever this entire last week.
> 
> My prompt was given by Jenni, so lots of thanks and love sent your way for such a fun idea. I hope it lived up to at least most of your hopes and expectations.
> 
> Now, to get the formalities quickly out of the way...
> 
> Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. It does not reflect upon the real life people mentioned, and I'm not profiting off of it at all. The story belongs to me (and Jenni). Please don't repost or print/distribute. Please do not share with any of the real people mentioned in this story (or anyone outside of the fandom in general?) because that's not cool. Okay.
> 
> Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed!


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